Thai customs officers look at rhino horns allegedly smuggled in from Mozambique at a press conference at the International Suvarnabhumi airport in Bangkok on January 7, 2013. The pieces were seized from a Vietnamese man at the airport. Photo: AFP

Police and customs officials in Hanoi Monday arrested a Vietnamese woman flying in from Bangkok and seized six kilograms of rhino horn from her.

Nguyen Thi Ngoc Tu, 29, was taken in at Noi Bai International Airport after scanners detected unusual items in her bag and customs officials decided to open it.

Tu said a person in Bangkok had paid her to carry the horns valued at around VND4 billion (US$188,100) on the black market.

Vietnam bans the commercial use of rhino horns but that has not effectively stopped the trade, which is fueled by a widespread belief in their medicinal effects, including as a cure for cancer.

But many also flaunt the horns as a status symbol.

Research funded by the World Wide Fund for Nature South Africa (WWF-SA) that surveyed 720 people in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City last year found that rhino horn consumers are wealthy and use the horn mostly to establish that.

Rising affluence has also triggered regular smuggling of ivory into Vietnam for consumption locally or smuggling to a third country.